Wednesday, October 24, 2012

Why It's Time For Monahan To Go

IT'S TIME TO REMEMBER
In case you've forgotten just what was the trigger point for all the chaos in Costa Mesa over the past nearly two years, let these video clips refresh your memories. Remember how then-mayor Gary Monahan chose to remain at his pub on St. Patrick's Day to keep on pulling beer taps on what he later described as "the biggest day of my life" to a news crew while the entire city staff mourned the loss of Huy Pham.

TOO BUSY FOR THE JOB
Let these clips be a reminder to you that Monahan, earlier this year, abdicated his mayoral throne to Eric Bever because his family and business obligations made it difficult for him to attend to his city duties. Remember that, shortly after stepping aside, he frequently missed important city meetings.

SAY GOOD-BYE, GARY
It's time for Monahan, after nearly two decades of service on the city council, to step aside and enjoy the fruits of his efforts - lifetime medical benefits and a pension. It's time for Monahan to go.

You forgot Jim and Gary formed the illegal two person sub committee that resulted in the failed "Layoffs" scheme that has costed the city millions, because they obviously didn't study anything. Remember they had no meetings.Also let us not forget that "Bar napkin " Deal to sell the Fairgrounds, I want to re-iterate that...SELL the Fairgrounds NOT SAVE it......that was Gary and Riggy from day one. That "Save the Fairgrounds" group was a fiasco which lied to every resident that supported it. They wanted it SOLD.A couple of weekends later Gary was overheard by vendors at the Marketplace telling people everything would be OK because he would be running it. Remember when Allan tried to expand the cities towing operators? Gary voted against that .At the time the towing operators were his business partners . When pressed about the conflict of interest he claimed they weren't listed as business partners. Later , it was revealed that the towing contractors WERE still partners listed on his license.Don't forget when the City was claiming "Fiscal insolvency" , the "Mayor" got the city to landscape in front of his restaurant, while violating municipal code to get it done. There were rumors for months after Huy Pham jumped that Gary's restaurant wasn't doing so well, yet on December 14th, last year, after the Andrew Brietbart fundraisers, all of a sudden Gary bought out all his partners, for $288,000. There's a lot of Gold over at that Rainbow.The ONLY council member who receives a pension is Gary Monahan, and he voted that for himself.Now this is the guy you want to turn the city over to , with a BLANK CHECK, and NO balance of powers under a badly written charter that has all the rules and protections stripped out of it?No, thanks. Everybody has always known that Gary Monahan has always looked after Gary Monahan, and the city has always come second. But it was "little graft", and for some reason a lot of people in the city kind of just expected it. Taking away the rules from General Law will give Gary a whole new enterprise,.......on a much , much bigger scale.

100% Correct. This guy isn't fit to serve in Costa Mesa. After putting that dive bar ahead of the welfare of the city employees and issuing city towing contracts to his busienss partners, it shows what kind of a person he is. Dump his ass.

I don't recall Geoff making any predictions. He endorses/supports certain candidates, but I don't seem to remember him gazing into a crystal ball and predicting anything.

We do appreciate the opportunity to vent, though - current council certainly gives us plenty of reasons to. Hopefully, that will change in a few weeks, then all two of you, including Fitzy and his many aliases, can come on here and vent too. It's quite therapeutic.

One more thing - have they caught the sign stealer yet, or is that just one more item on a long list of unsolved crimes that seem to generate 'sympathy' for this council? Let's see, there was a brick through the window, and some paint on a truck, and a weird DUI situation, and now sign stealers. All were pretty much followed by silly press conferences, but has anybody ever been caught or charged on any of them? Hmmmmmmm....

While the City Council complains about the "unfunded liability nightmare" which the residents will be paying on forever. Gary Monahan voted to include himself in the exact same pension system, needs the additional time on the Water Board (city) payroll to qualify for the same medical and pension benefits, as the police and fire employees, at taxpayer expense, for life. He should already have benefits on the same contract as his restaurant employees. Is he setting himself up for double dipping at taxpayer expense? GREED & HIPOCRACY ON STEROIDS! He will have everything paid for by Obamacare in 2014.

Yes, even if you support the crooked charter and the other BM's, Gary has got to go. He voted for the current police contract right before the 2010 election that gave his new best friend,Righeimer, no voice in negotiations. Why is that overlooked? The OCGOP vilifies Leece, but Gary voted the same way. He has voted for every employee contract presented to him. He gets a health benefit package that only Hatch gets, plus a pension, and then vilifies those who actually work. Dick head and Fitzpatrick talk about "past councils". Well Gary is one of those past councils. He is even a disgrace to his Irish heritage. No self respecting Irish man would wear such a disgusting outfit on St. Patricks Day. The Irish have been for the working man for generations. I guess Gary forgets about the sacrafices his Irish ancestors made in America.

Let us remember that Huy Pham, hadn't been to work in weeks, was on cocaine the day he selfishly chose to endanger his co-workers and members of the public by killing himself at City Hall. Let us remember it was within minutes that the OC Employees goons were exploiting this poor guy for their political gain. The residents remember. That is why Monahan will finish first in the balloting this year and why we are voting for him. The hate that comes from guys like West and his cronnies never seems to amaze me. Disgusting!

Barry,I'd welcome you back, but your lies are NOT welcome here. I posted yours this time to show people that you remain an idiot. It was NEVER proven that Huy Pham was on cocaine, you jerk! He was out of work because he injured his foot training to make an attempt to climb Mt. Everest. He was an excellent employee and we'll never know why he leaped from the roof, but that's what the investigation determined happened - he leaped to his death after being called into work to receive his layoff notice. Just keep on chanting the CM Press mantra - that any opinion that differs with yours is "hate"... You are truly a buffoon with no ability to consider issues independently. Just take another swig of Kool-Aid. You've worn out your welcome here, just as Monahan has in this city.

Barry, I suppose you have evidence he took coke the day of the suicide? I've not seen that. Only that he had used it in the past. Big deal! That doesn't excuse Monahan's drunken dress wearing escapades. He refused his employees when they needed him. He help CAUSE it. And he couldn't be bothered for the sake of "his money". And the lying about the towing contracts, and everything else that sneaky little snake has done. He has no business on our council.

Kent Mora in response to Fitzpatrick and Dickson's hit piece of city employees states in the private sector on a 65k a year job there is about 30-35 percent compensation increase getting to about 87k. That's the private sector keep in mind.

Now go to the city employees compensation page. Compare those general city employees they attack and those who have layoff notices because they are bleeding the city dry whose base salaries are at 65k. Not public safety or dispatchers where huge overtime cost factor in just the average city employee. It's basically the same as the private sector. Yet we have vilified these hard workers receiving about the same pay as the private sector as bleeding the city dry and given them layoff notices.

So according to Mr Mora who rails against the high pensions of city staff the people under the most attack and those with layoff notices for contracting out make almost exactly what the private sector does.

Yet you hear over and over like from Rob Dickson and Fitpatrick how outrageous the city employees salaries and pensions and are.

The general city employees pay and compensation does not bleed the city dry as some try to imply. Dickson, Fitzpatrick and others should be ashamed at their attempts to create anger and hate toward general city employees.

In fact look at every general city employee on that page whose base salary is near or below 65k, they are all near or below 88k in total compensation making that entire page of general city employees total compensation on same level as what Mr Mora says is par for the private sector.

Utterly disgusting what some try to do when you look at the REAL FACTS and not their BS.

Answer for Mike McNutt ....Two more suspects have turned up for the sign stealer. Remember the photo of the guy with a long, long beard? Take a look at the long beard in this photo: http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/hajj-pilgrimage-to-mecca/2012/10/23/db1d01a2-1d1c-11e2-ba31-3083ca97c314_gallery.html?hpid=z8#photo=5 He has clumsily tried to mask his nose and moustache, has donned glasses, and added what looks like a prayer cap to hide his bald head … and has bleached and dyed his beard. If you squint a little and turn the lights out, could be the guy, though. He must be the one. Look how far he's run to avoid being caught! Here’s another one. At least we know his name is Mel, according to the journal Annals of Improbable Research. http://www.improbable.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/01/mel-150-wide.gif He could have worn a fake bald head to pose for the sign-stealing photography. Note that both of them are looking to the right. Maybe this means the guy is a right winger in the employ of the right wing 3Ms?

Barry your own post shows what a hypocrite you are. You disparage the worker as being on coke, off work, selfishly endangering his coworkers etc. Then you turn around and act like you have sympathy saying OC employee goons exploited this poor guy.

You sir have no compassion for anyone as is evident by your blatant hypocrisy.

And the cocaine stuff is not conclusive. The derivative found in his body is also a derivative of pain killers. Which by the way as you noted he was home because of a broken ankle. Painkillers could have been used.

But let's say it was cocaine. Did he take the cocaine knowing he was going to jump? Can you say the layoff notice wasn't the reason? He comes in to get his notice and instead goes to the roof and jumps and many others seriously try to imply it's the coke he may have taken and nothing to do with the layoffs.

Why does "West wrong again" speak with the same accent that Martin Millard speaks with? Barry at least has taken minimal pains to disguise his voice.

Al Kohol, I've been saying for weeks that Gary's rectality has been due to a beer deficiency. But he's getting so rich selling those diet cokes to other councilmen that he has fatally ignored the cure for this ailment, and will likely die of aspartamosis of the liver. I hope that he doesn't mix diet coke (especially the high-potency three-dollar variety) with any kind of acetaminophen -- that will surely terminate any liver function remaining to him.

Gary's "No comment" at city hall is certainly not much different to his failure to communicate about my attempt to cure his beer deficiency, but I didn't expect the latter in view of the former. Ah, well... hindsight's 20/20.

too bad the suicide was brought up again. let him RIP. he had coke in his system, Gary didn't push him. Let it rest.

Gary getting pension at water board someone wrote. ?? There are no pensions there anymore. Only one long time Director has some vestige of it according to questions asked last election.

Don't all council members get a pension? Looks like it on compensation chart. So not just Gary. Wendy too. But Gericault says the opposite. Trust him for facts? Remember , he said in a video that half the employees were laid off. Then he stated a car allowance for the CEO at twice what it is. I don't trust a thing he says. Loose cannon.

And to the poster who thinks the sign stealer is some sort of made up thing: get real. it will break soon enough and you won't be happy about who it is. And it is not the private tow truck driver as speculated. And the beard did get shaved as predicted but to no avail.

equipment mechanic base salary and total comp mentioned by another poster. Well, that's before committing a crime. Since this guy looks like an equipment mechanic I throw that in for your perusal. Of course, he he did it on his own time I guess he gets a pass ?

Surprised at all the anti Gary, 3M postings here. Looks like a landslide vote for the top 3, well at least 15 votes. Guess it depends on how many "we"'s there are in the city who may even it up a tad or perhaps a bit more.

We keep hearing 'it will break soon enough' about all these bogus bricks, painters, haters calling in DUIs, etc... and then we never see anything break. I'm just sayin'...nothing ever breaks after the publicity dies down. It just blows away...

@ truth-- You must either be a relative of Gary, hot for the little guy or one of the other numbskulls currently trying to further the destruction of this City.Gary doesn't care about the City or the residents, all he wants is the Citys money for medical coverage.

CORRECTION: Apologies for the Senior Moment in confusing Bever. Both men complain about the "unfunded liability nightmare" for which the residents will have obligation to pay forever. Gary Monahan voted to include himself and Hatch in the exact same health benefits. Bever needs the additional time on the Water Board (city) payroll to qualify for the same medical benefits, as the police and fire employees, at taxpayer expense, for life. Gary Monahan should already have benefits under the same contract he offers to his restaurant employees. Monahan will be double dipping at taxpayer expense? GREED & HIPOCRACY ON STEROIDS! Now, at age 95 you are cancelled by all pension health plans and forced in Medicare, which will become Obama Care in Jan 2014 which could cancel all employer health plans, bacause employers have determined it is simply less expensive to pay the fines to IRS than pay for health insurance policies. All this jocking will become a moot point after ObamaCare begins in Jan. 2014.

A friendly fact for all you Gary, other (b)M, and their puppetmeister lovers: If the election was held today, they'd lose just like they will lose in a few weeks! Same goes for the one man's "charter".If the best you can do is rant and rave and call press conferences about someone stealing your campaign signs and point fingers at the opposition to try and distract from the real issues at hand, which are all against you, you've got nothing!!!!!!!!! You've got a rouge individual (it's unfortunate that he is a city employee) who is acting ON HIS OWN taking down signs and all you can do is slam and accuse your opposition of ONE person's stupid, individual actions. All you can do is sling steaming piles of falsehoods everywhere.

And, if Gary were a true leader, he'd lead the way in pension reform and renounce his and his health insurance - but you won't in a million years see that coming from him!!!

When you only care about yourself and your special interest pals, (like the RIGmeister, the (b)Ms, and their associated detritis), you have NO business in OUR city's government. We, the People of Costa Mesa, know this and will make the right choice for real representation with Stephens, Genis and Weitzberg! And, We, the People of Costa Mesa, know this one man's "charter" is a sham and will make the right choice against it! We, the People of Costa Mesa, know that the RIGmeister, the (b)Ms, and their associated detritis-and "charter"-are wrong for OUR city; they are driving OUR city and its good name into the ground. The big question now is when they all lose, will they go quietly, honorably away? Or will they rant and rave, call press conferences, be poor losers and attack the winners with false accusations of election and voter fraud?? Knowing this bunch, they'll do anything but accept their defeat with grace and good character.

Here’s a better suspect. It’s it’s not as good as a photo, but at least its’ better than the fuzzy cam of the Violator. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:SmithBrothers_02.gifIts’ the one on the right Notice the pattern? The suspects are always either on the right or facing right … definite proof theyre in cahoots with the right wing politicians.He’s on a cardboard box, so he must be one of these homeless guys on the Westide. See that “Menthol”? That means he’s on drugs, too. If that’s him, we know his name, Mark Smith. His brother is Trade.The cops could probably pick him up tomorrow from the soup kitchen.With that beard and a fake bald head, hes a dead rigger for the Violator. Start writing that check CMTA!

FYI- a few days ago a CM4RG member recognized the man in the vandalism video and contacted the police. It was the responsible thing to do. If the ID turns out to be correct we will all hear about it.

Meanwhile I would love to find the Anti-American enemies of free speech that are vandalizing and stealing our signs as well. It doesn’t matter who is doing it, it’s wrong. It is certainly happening against both sides. We of course can’t afford PI’s to drive around the city in the wee hours, but if anyone has seen anything, please contact us through our website at www.cm4rg.org . More than 500 of our signs have been stolen, some ripped up and scattered on lawns, shoved under bushes or pieces tossed in the street. Ironically, Monday evening when I returned from speaking with the Channel 5 reporter I found the No on V sign in my yard gone and two No on V signs in yards across Mesa Verde Drive damaged and knocked down.

During the same weekend signs on Fair Drive were vandalized, Friday all the No on V signs along Mesa Verde drive were stolen-the street was completely stripped of No on V! We replaced some, they were stolen again by Saturday, we replaced fewer , by the time our volunteers picked them up Sunday evening, more had been stolen. Some thefts happened in broad daylight, someone had to see something.

Anyway, can we all just cool it? Appreciate the rights of free speech that we have, celebrate democracy! Leave the signs alone, and get back to focusing on the real issues of the campaign.

K6JOY mada a correction about Gary and the water board and now says it is Bever he meant. OK. Now if he will just correct "water board (city)" part. They are not the same. Independent, different service areas. Eventually he may get it correct. But since he has continually failed to get facts straight one has to wonder is his conjectures can even be contemplated since they are just that, guesses, not facts. And his facts are continually wrong. Dismiss his ramblings.

TruthWell then, should we disqualify you for the goofs you make? You never bother to correct them. You always sound goofy and seldom make sense. Ever proofread your stuff? I lol, but don't think you are trying to be funny.